Silent all these years - Tori Amos

Listening to Tori Amos these days you can't help but wonder what happened to the magic of her earlier work. It seems to have completely disappeared. But it would be difficult to keep performing on that level: 'Silent all these years', coupled with 'Me and a Gun' was a stunning debut. The latter, originally presented as the A-side of the single, was an acapella song about rape.

Tori herself commented: 'In the song I say it was 'Me and a Gun' but it wasn't a gun. It was a knife he had. And the idea was to take me to his friends and cut me up, and he kept telling me that, for hours. And if he hadn't needed more drugs I would have been just one more news report, where you see the parents grieving for their daughter. And I was singing hymns, as I say in the song, because he told me to. I sang to stay alive. Yet I survived that torture, which left me urinating all over myself and left me paralysed for years. That's what that night was all about, mutilation, more than violation through sex.'

'Silent all these years' was a more accessible song, and so radio stations began to play that instead. Ultimately the single was re-released with nearly identical packaging but retitled as 'Silent all these years'.

My collection: 7" single no. 1949

Found: Record fair, Amsterdam, September 25, 1993

Cost: 5 guilders

Tracks: 'Silent all these years' / 'Me and a gun'